Rivers, Wings, & Sky

A collaboration between Nancy Losacker and Poet Norma Wilson

Nancy Losacker and Norma Wilson have been collaborating since 2008. In July 2013, the two received a grant from the South Dakota Arts Council to assist them in taking their collaboration to galleries in South Dakota and other states. In 2014, the SD Humanities Council awarded Wilson and Losacker with a Media Grant for presentations on the exhibit. Rivers, Wings & Sky is now a Speaker's Bureau Program, and Wilson and Losacker spoke about their collaboration at the 2015 South Dakota Book Festival.

Their first showing of Rivers, Wings & Sky was at Mount Marty College's Bede Gallery on September 30, 2013 and closed with a Reception, Reading and Gallery Talk. They expanded their exhibit for a second show at the University of South Dakota's Atrium Gallery in January 2014. Since then it has been shown at Spirit Room Gallery, Fargo, ND; Yankton Area Arts hosted the exhibit at GAR Gallery, Yankton, SD; Vangarde Arts, Sioux City, Iowa; Dahl Arts Center in Rapid City, SD; Sioux City Iowa Art Center, Sioux City, SD and Augustana College's Center for Western Studies, Sioux Falls, SD.

The exhibit culminated in a book, Rivers, Wings & Sky which was published in 2016 by Scurfpea Publishing. The book can be purchased here.

Valentine’s Day

Waking to a white world, rejoice in stillness before the deer, raccoonsand we make trackson white pathsdown to the icypond and spring.

A century later,
white-winged birdsride the North windssoaring over the curving riverglistening with sunlight,the checkered fieldsof green and brown,the river bankswith umbrella-like shadethat oncebelonged to all. Even birds sharing seedsseem to knowthat Earth’s abundanceis the white wing of peace,falling to earthas flakes of snow.

Blue Jay Blue

How could we ignore you,strong-willed Jaybird?

Walking on air,you search for seedsto eat right now.You hog the feeder and guard your nest.

Can the river bottomland sustain these cropsplanted with herbicides and pesticideson every inch of soil with a near-sighted visionof this year’s profit?

From our sheltered homebeneath the brow of the ridge,we hear and see the power of thunder and windas rare horizontal rain sweeps across from the west.

Deep in our rootswe know we all must be fedby the Earth beneath our feet.Like Earth, we rely on Sky.

Only the long viewof generations who lived herebefore us and of those who will livehere after we are gonecan keep us free.

Monarch Crossing

Each September, fewer orange chiffon Monarchsflit across the bluff to rest on cottonwoodsand willows around our pond.Fiery wingsflutter in waning sunlightwaiting to fly across the Missouriand Gulf to Mexico’s Oyamel fir trees.

Delicate wings carry them two thousand miles, without passports, to the Sierra Madre del Sur.Exhausted they sleep on mountaintopsall winter.When March sunlight wakes them, theymate, and the Kings die. The Queens fly north,to lay their eggs on Milkweed. Then they also die.

Caterpillar babieshatch in just four days,eat Milkweed leavesfor two weeks,attach to twigs,exude their jeweledchrysalis, and begin transformation.

Emerging after ten days, their wings unfoldto fly. But only the fourth generationmigrates south. Monarcha Mariposaare dearto Mexico’s forest people who see in their flight the revived spiritsof children who lost the struggle to survive.

Will we ever stop burning fuels that warmthe planet and kill the Oyamel firs?
Will we ever transition tosun and wind?Will we ever enactneighborly laws to sustainthe monarchs, trees and migrants?

Sharing the Lead

A trillion times worsethan naughty childrenwe fight over dark life blooddistilled from ancestral sands.

Wanting all of itwe melt the ancient glaciersto race from place to placefor the green paper dollar.

We deplete our planet with warspolluting the quiet of falling snow,the joyous barks of geese as they glidein constant motion, sharing the lead.

From deep in the Earthclean water flows.Bluestem and buffalo grassshine. Sunlight feeds useach spring, summer, falland throughout the winter.

When will we stop fighting?Know our enemies as friends,resources we must cherishon Earth we must share.

River Song

They lived in small gray shackson the bank of the muddy Cumberlandwhere men with cane poles caughtcatfish for their families to eatuntil the nineteen fiftieswhen the City tore their houses downand moved the peoplewe called “colored”to Lincoln Homes apartmentson the other side of town.

Corn and tobacco grew on the river bottomlandas we watched the tugboats and bargesfloat logs and coal.“Over the river and through the woods”to Grandmother’s house we’d sing and go.I never swam in the sourceof water I drank,but the river is in my blood.

I crossed the Mississippi,saw the infinite sky, and knewI’d never go back.

In Dakota, my man and Ibuilt our home near the wide Missouri.One summer day we canoed acrossto an island. I waded out to water waist deep,dropped to my back, rolled to my stomach,let the current take me to a wilder place.

A shovelnose sturgeon swam in warm clear water.A green heron glided into cottonwood leaves.Rueing the day the people,who named the river Mni Sose,left this Paradise and followed a steamboatto Greenwood Agency to survive upstream,I waded back through minnows, against the current,to join my mate.

A Canvasback floated byas the river sang mewhat it was and could be,meandering down, downto the sea.

Bird’s-eye Views

1Storm cloud columns shadehouses and trees to the north.Waiting for rain, the Vermillionturns inky blue, slitheringto the wide Missouri. Through fieldsof soybeans and corn it winds,this serpentine river of yours and mine.

2Rain turns the world gray for an hour.Then the sky blooms lavender-pink.
Fields try on the pastel shadesof spring. Blue green are the treeson a heron’s island home.A beaver emerges floating a logtoward her expanding lodge. We bask in cool air after the rain.

3Now the river flows like the changein light, unpredictable and perfectunder a deep blue sky. The goldensun warms seeds, and corms awake.The shapes of fields conformto whims of water flowing beside them.Trees topple, banks crumble, sand washesfrom the bank to the center.Beyond our controlthe river shapes the shore.